Off on a tangent: Weirdly Complicated Machines and Processes

I am learning about printing history along with seed company history.  Unexpected, but cool.

When I was a little kid my Pop took me into a print shop where this absolutely gigantic machine cast my name in a lead slug.  The linotype machine was like Oz...and the guy who sat there and typed in my name was really a wizard as far as I was concerned.

My father used the linotype service to produce text to paste into camera ready artwork for everything from catalogs to package design. Rubber cement and little bits of glued down paper were how you created pages.  It seems so crude now, and I grew up with it!

The electrotype procedure is a little harder to get my head around, but it must have been an incredible money saver!
From Wikipedia: As described in an 1890 treatise, electrotyping produces "an exact facsimile of any object having an irregular surface, whether it be an engraved steel- or copper-plate, a wood-cut, or a form of set-up type, to be used for printing;  ... In printing, electrotyping had become a standard method for producing plates for letterpress printing by the late 1800s."

This explanation is really good!  Good ol' Ebay just cast this up on the shores of my blog.

"One of the most popular suppliers of engravings in the 1880s and 1890s was Albert Blanc.

Horticultural engraver and electrotyper, was born at Antwerp, Belgium, in 1850. When eighteen years of age he came to America, locating in Philadelphia, and secured employment in one of the leading engraving establishments. In 1870 he began business for himself. His proficiency quickly brought him to the front, and success greeted his venture. In 1885 he began the study of horticultural engraving and electrotyping, and since then he has had practically a monopoly of this business. His engravings are used on all parts of the globe, from the Russian capital to the Cape of Good Hope, and from the American continent to Australia. He has practically revolutionized the seed and floral trade, enabling any seedsman to illustrate his catalogue at comparatively little expense. Catalogues of new engravings are issued yearly, of which he furnishes duplicates at a very moderate charge.

Some four years ago Mr. Blanc began the cultivation of cactus plants for pleasure, and appreciating their beauty, as well as their ease of cultivation in apartments and gardens, he concluded to make them popular, and went into the business on an extensive scale. He engaged collectors in all parts of the world, and under the firm name of A. Blanc & Co. this is now the largest establishment known for the cultivation and propagation of these interesting plants. They supply most of the wholesale houses here as well as in Europe. Their yearly exhibitions in Horticultural Hall usually attract the greatest attention, plants being shown there that cannot be duplicated anywhere.

A. Blanc & Co.'s catalogue and "Hints on Cacti" are most beautiful works, well calculated to give the craze to every lover of the curious and interesting. Their extensive greenhouses at Forty-eighth and Walnut streets have proved to be very attractive to connoisseurs. From there they supply not only the humble artisan who wants a few plants for his window, but also the Royal Gardens at Kew, England, where can be seen some giant cacti in all their glory, and which excite the wonder and admiration of all who visit these well known gardens. A. Blanc & Co. have also agencies near Tucson, Arizona, and Monterey, Mex." From: 1891 - Philadelphia and Popular Philadelphians

Below is a page from a Vilmorin-Andrieux & Cie, 1888 catalog  from which a seed company or nursery could order electrotype printing plates.

  This thick catalogue assembles the vast collection of wood-engraved illustrations used by the Vilmorin-Andrieux firm in their seed catalogues and other publications. Electrotype printing blocks for all the images depicted could be ordered from the firm for use in illustrating retail seed and nursery catalogues. Instructions for ordering these are printed at the front in French, English and German. The numbered illustrations are printed on one side of the sheet only, "the other is intended for the illustrations which we may publish in the future and copies of which will be sent to all the purchasers of this album, to be pasted on the blank side corresponding to the numbers." Altogether at least 4000 images are included, the majority of which are devoted to flowers, although vegetables, herbs, trees, fruits, grasses, garden implements, etc. are also shown. The illustrations are accompanied by descriptions in French, English and German, and by prices in francs and sterling.